From AP, March 22:

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — Authorities launched a probe today into the killings by Afghan security forces of at least 15 people, who an Afghan army commander claimed were Taliban rebels but locals said were tribesmen wanting to attend a religious festival.

On March 16, 2003, Washington state-born activist Rachel Corrie, 23, was crushed to death by an Israeli bulldozer while acting as a "human shield" against the demolition of a Palestinian home in Rafah, on the Gaza Strip. Last year, Katherine Viner, an editor at The Guardian, and actor Alan Rickman (known for roles in Sense and Sensibility and Love Actually) adapted 184 pages of Corrie's journals and e-mails, beginning at the age of 10, into a stage play. My Name is Rachel Corrie, directed by Rickman and starring Meghan Dodds, ran to wide acclaim in London. It was scheduled to arrive on March 22 at the New York Theater Workshop, known for embracing such controversial material as Tony Kushner's Angels in America; Homebody, Kabul and the original pre-Broadway Rent. In late February, just weeks before the play was to begin, the theater's artistic director, James Nicola, announced in a statement that the play would be "postponed indefinitely," citing a "very edgy situation" following the illness of Ariel Sharon and the election of Hamas.

From Reuters, via Khajeel Times, March 21:

QUETTA, Pakistan - Suspected militants blew up a gas pipeline in Baluchistan on Tuesday, the latest attack in the troubled southwest Pakistan province where rebels are fighting for greater autonomy, officials said.

From Reuters, March 21:

President George W. Bush held out the possibility on Tuesday of a U.S. troop presence in Iraq for many years, saying a full withdrawal would depend on decisions by future U.S. presidents and Iraqi governments.

Another expendable piece of cannon fodder is scapegoated...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. Army dog handler was found guilty on Tuesday of abusing detainees at Baghdad's notorious Abu Ghraib prison and faces up to eight years and nine months in prison, an Army spokeswoman said.

Freedom's on the march. From the BBC, March 20:

An Afghan man is being tried in a court in the capital, Kabul, for converting from Islam to Christianity.

A March 21 statement from the San José de Apartadó Peace Community:

We call for national and international solidarity to demand the freedom of GILDARDO TUBERQUIA, member of the Internal Council of the Peace Community, who has been illegally detained today, March 21 at 8:45 AM, by the Police. Gildardo refused to register his personal information at the police roadblock at El Mangolo, located at the exit of Apartadó on the road to San José de Apartadó. He was detained for demanding that the police comply with Sentence C-1024 of 2002 of the Constitutional Court, which prohibits organisms of the State from demanding the registration of personal information, such as place of dwelling and work, activities and family relations, and others not strictly needed for legal identification of the person.

Lukashenko is doubtless correct that the protesters are backed by the West—or are about to be. Can we—meaning progressives in the West—possibly think of a more creative response to this dilemma than rallying around Lukashenko? From the BBC, March 21:

Hundreds of demonstrators have spent the night camped out in the Belarussian capital, Minsk, as they continue a protest over the presidential election.